My request: more action or less talk in the sequel

Rating: 7/10 (21 June 2015)

When the first trailer came out it was quite obvious what to expect. It convinced me that Pacific Rim will be an action packed blockbuster which doesn't want to take itself too seriously. It's one and only goal is to be entertaining. I was okay with that and said: bring it on!
Visually this movie is unexceptional, there is no question. Even Michael Bay would hide behind his render farm because Autobots and Decepticons are just the shadow of these giant Jaegers. Well choreographed fights are the top of the cake. Every move, every punch was clearly visible and this made encounters more enjoyable. My eyes could follow every epic second and i was able to tell who fought with what, unlike many fight scenes in Transformers.
Besides the stunning visuals the movie has some other good points. Del Toro has a great sense to create original and unique worlds by using set design and practical effects. Hellboy and Pan's Labyrinth are the perfect examples for that. In this case, he had less chance to shine his talent because most of the scenes were dominated by special effects. In spite of this, he could smuggle some of his trademark into the events which made those look more existing. Many object and place were practically made and this helped to balance the high use of CGI. For instance, the Kaiju's parts in those huge containers or the internal space of a Jaeger's head (the control panel for the pilots) were actually built. Moreover, the set design looked not just outstanding but also effectively functioning.
The exposition part was great, enough information was given and it built up the upcoming events very well. The two pilot system was reasonable and creative, such as the idea of the "drift" which served as a strong bond to control machines.
There are two reasons why i gave this title 7 instead of 8. Firstly, the "characters". I wasn't expecting deep or multidimensional characters but what i received is clearly below the line. Rinko Kikuchi was so terrible she could easily win an award for the most annoying character of the year. The others were average or even worse, the only positive exception was Ron Perlman, his manifestations were the only highlights of dialogs.
The second problem was the relatively few action scenes compared to the length of the movie. The first 15 minutes met my expectations, it made me stunned and amazed at the same time. Unfortunately, after the first encounter nothing happened for an hour. Instead of more action we received more irrelevant dialogs and clichés backstories which was a unreasonable move. The running time could bear more action or less talk...
In the very end i got what i wanted but it couldn't cause that complete satisfaction i was looking for. All in all, it is what it looks like. Brainless epic fights are guaranteed, just the right amount of them are missing. However, i will definitely watch the sequel as well.